It's time to shut this thing down. It started as a way for me to get things out that were festering. And a way to share my memories of Jill. It's mutated into something else. A way to cling to her. A way to not let go.
Not letting go is quite literally killing me. Slowly. I didn't know before how desolate the present is when you cannot imagine a future. When you only knock around in dusty rooms inside your mind in which you can revisit the past. But every trip there the colors are a little more muted. The details a bit more faded. Still, it's where I most want to be. Back there. With her. My health is not so good. I'm not doing any of the stuff I should. Because the future is something I've allowed to become...meaningless.
She'd be ashamed of me.
I don't really want to let go. She's the best thing I ever held. I don't really know if I can. I know I better start trying. The only thing harder than letting her go is knowing she’d be ashamed of me for not trying.
I never gave up on you, Jill. Yeah, I gave up on your body’s ability to soldier on but as much as I loved that delicious vessel it was just the thing that carried you. It was the vehicle through which I got to access the heart, the soul, the beauty, the tempestuousness, the energy and the love of your incomparable youness. I loved all of it, all of you, all that overwhelmingly succulent youness of my Jill Harper. Still do.
My friend Levi puts questions up on his Facebook page. Sometimes simple, sometimes complex. He put one up this week that obliterated me. And gave me the last entry. One last burst of not letting go before taking whatever tentative steps into the future I can dream up.
“If you could have lunch with anyone, who would it be and what would you have?”
Jill. And anything she wants. As long as we’re sitting in a booth so I can sit across from her and watch her as she reads the menu and interrogate me on which dishes she should have. As long as I can watch her face light up when she lands on the perfect dish. As long as I can grin stupidly watching her then layer on side orders, whether or not they're on the menu, to some poor waiter trying madly to separate the actual order from the thought process as she fires off a stream of conscious order. As long as I can laugh my ass off listening to her try, and fail spectacularly, to pronounce chile relleno. Really...it's magical.
As long as sometime after the food shows up I slide my order over to her side of the table and slide around to join her. Because while I could look at that face forever I want to feel the warmth of her thigh against mine. As long as she eventually, as she always did, threads her arm through mine...somehow it was always her left arm threaded through me right, so her dominant hand was free and mine was pinned to my side, making the manipulation of utensils an adventure for me while she could plow through her food unimpeded. As long as she promised never to take her arm back...to hell with eating. As long as she'd lean up against me, head on my shoulder so with the slightest turn of my head I could smell her hair and kiss the top of her head. Oh, Jesus, to feel her head on my shoulder just once more. As long as I could pretend to be pissed when she'd eat half my fries and hear her say,
“They're share fries”
“No they're not, you didn't want any fries”
And she'd laugh at me and kiss me on the cheek and say again “they're share fries…’cause you're my guy”.
Oh, hell yes. Absolutely, yes, I'm her guy. Take the damn fries just don't ever stop wanting me to be your guy.
As long as no one calls the cops when I scream at that poor, baffled waiter “No...goddammit, no! Do not bring the check. You cannot bring the check.” Because if he brings the check it means it's over. It means we’re done. It means we’re gonna have to pay up and leave and she goes to heaven and I go to pieces. As long as I don't have to pay the check and lunch can bleed into dinner and breakfast and snacks and lunch again and on and on until time ends. Until there is no future that doesn't have her in it. Until there's no more light in the world, no more breath in my lungs, no more tomorrows where I wake up without her.
Lunch with her. And she can have any damn thing she wants. And I can be her guy. Always. Forever.
Jill’s.
I can only imagine your pain.
You clearly loved her; dearly.
I wish you the best.
Your life was enriched by her love; go forth and enrich others'.
Posted by: Anonymous | January 30, 2017 at 01:06 PM
Oh dear cuzzie...it was one of your shorter posts, and likely the most profound. I am crying (really sobbing hysterically) so there may be some typos. I feel for you, and I know that I cannot know exactly how you feel, but I ache for you all the same. Your writing is such a great truth and you are so eloquent, it makes me open up places in my heart that have been closed for a long time. I love the last post...go out and enrich others. Jill would have wanted that..you are too much of a treasure not to share it with the world.
love you..cousin kris
Posted by: Kris Wrede | January 30, 2017 at 09:20 PM